EA: Wii U can do "anything" PS3, 360 can

Newly received dev kits have increased EA Sports' belief that Wii U can do "anything" that PS3 and Xbox 360 can do, vice president Andrew Wilson informed Eurogamer.

"The short answer is yes [we have a better idea of Wii U's power]; the longer answer is not quite," said Wilson.

"As every new piece of hardware and every new development library comes through we get a greater understanding of the power. With our early research we had been very happy with the output of the box and we expect that that will only go up moving forward.

"There are added challenges for us as developers when you think about rendering on two screens and what that might mean, but we're looking forward to that challenge.

"It's still moving," he added, "but I think we'll be able to do anything that we can do on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on the Wii U."

The Wii U will be released, officially, after April 2012. Unofficially, Eurogamer can narrow that date to after August, as Darksiders II is a confirmed Wii U launch title, and still over a year away.

"It's still moving, but I think we'll be able to do anything that we can do on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on the Wii U."

Andrew Wilson, vice president, EA Sports

Xbox 360 launched in late 2005, and PS3 launched in late 2006 (March 2007 in Europe). More than five years on, can Wii U not go beyond what PS3 and 360 are capable of?

"I think that's our hope," answered Wilson, "but again we're still in the early stages."

A large question lingers around what the online capabilities of Wii U will be. Wilson wouldn't say whether new dev kits reveal more online Wii U functionality, but did highlight an "openness and willingness" by Nintendo to listen to their developer and publisher partners.

There are people at EA "under very strict NDAs" that are working those online Wii U systems out with Nintendo.

"[Online is] something that we're working very closely with Nintendo on," said Wilson. "We are highlighting to them what we believe are the most important elements to that infrastructure to deliver a connected experience that we think is the future of gaming.

"We have a series of people who are under very strict NDAs as you can imagine, operating with [Nintendo], building that [online] system out."

Andrew Wilson

"They have demonstrated an openness and willingness to work with us and work with developers that I think will only land us in a positive place.

"We're working through the development with them now," he added. "We have a series of people who are under very strict NDAs as you can imagine, operating with them, building that system out."

FIFA 13 will likely be a Wii U launch title, but could be separated, in terms of release date, from the other FIFA 13 SKUs. "The timing of that VIP party [Wii U launch] is largely dependent on Nintendo," said Wilson, "which we're waiting to hear like everyone.

"We're preparing development and we will make a judgement-call on the timing of that and how it relates to the other platforms once they have a better idea of when they're launching."

Wilson said development of FIFA 13 on Wii U has not begun.

"Not yet," Wilson remarked. "We are in pre-production for everything on FIFA, so we have our long-lead team thinking about Kinect ... Wii U ... What FIFA looks like on PS3, PC, Xbox 360 in general. But the core team is still finaling FIFA 12. So it's very much an early pre-production ideation phase right now."